no reports yet of any casualties on the u.s. side, which happened near the jalal bad air force in eastern afghanistan. the journalist ben farmer. ben, good morning. the taliban is claiming responsibility for this attack. can you tell us how this happened? >> well, it was an attack that happened around 6:00 this morning. there seems to be a very coordinated, quite complex attack. it began with two suicide car bombs at the jalalabad airfields. these attackers were armed with -- some of them were -- now, as they tried to get in, there was a two-hour firefight. the defenders of the base fought for two hours to keep them out. during that time helicopters on the airfield scrambled, took part m battle. they fired down on the militants. it was all over at about 8:00, 8:30. nato said that none of the militants managed to get inside the base. we understand there were nine that were all killed during the battle. also killed were four afghan private security guards who were guarding the gate and two civilians who had the misfortune to be pa